This guide outlines considerations for supplying artwork to avoid delays and ensure great-quality print.
File formats
Regardless of what software is used to create your artwork, your final artwork file should be exported to a print-ready file format at an appropriate size, in the correct colour mode and featuring sufficient bleed area around the edge.
File size
The maximum file size that can be submitted is 1GB. This should be more than enough capacity to accommodate artwork at the required resolution for most of our products, provided an appropriate file format is used.
It’s also important that your file is not too small. An image that appears fine on screen may lose quality when printed full size.
PDFs
We request all our artwork to be supplied as high resolution (300dpi). You must correctly prepare your PDF file. These options must be set for commercial printing:
- Resolution – Choose High Resolution
- Compression Settings – For colour and greyscale this should be downsampled to 300dpi with “auto compression” set on high
- Font Embedding – Should be set to “embed all fonts”
Colour needs to be set as CMYK not RGB (RGB artwork will be converted to CMYK and this could affect your colours).
Illustrator
Include all embedded images and convert all text to curves. Save as an EPS file.
Photoshop
Set Resolution to 300dpi when starting your new document. Save the file as either TIFF or JPEG.
Other files not listed above must be saved either as an EPS or JPEG.
Note: If you need us to make changes to your file (JPEG / EPS), we will require you to re-supply new artwork as either a PSD, PDF or AI file as we are unable to make changes to flattened images (JPEG / EPS / TIFF).
Unfortunately, we’re unable to use Microsoft documents for printing which includes:
- Word
- Excel
- Powerpoint
- Publisher
- Works
As these applications aren’t designed to prepare print-ready artwork, we recommend you avoid them in favour of dedicated design software. However, if you’re unable to create your artwork in any other program, it is possible to convert your Microsoft document from the proprietary file format into a print-ready PDF, you can find more details here: https://www.zamzar.com/.
Colour
Any artwork that’s intended for print should be created in (or converted to) CMYK – not RGB. That’s because CMYK files achieve colours by mixing Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Key (Black) in the same way that printers mix inks to achieve colours on the page.
Pantone colours will be converted to CMYK unless specifically requested and quoted for by one of our sales team.
Artwork bleed
There must be a minimum 3mm bleed around your artwork to account for very slight variances during the trimming process.
For example, an A6 size product is 148 x 105 mm.
To supply artwork for this product, your file would need to be 154 x 111 mm
Any background colours or designs would need to extend right to the edge.
Crop marks
Adding crop marks to your artwork is not necessary. If you have experience designing for print, by all means, add them as correctly placed crop marks can save time and help us align your design.
However, as long as the artwork is supplied at the correct dimensions with a 3mm bleed on all sides, we’ll be able to set it up for print without crop marks.